Charles Alfred Crofts (11 July 1871 – 25 March 1950) was an Australian trade unionist. Born at

Bethnal Green Bethnal Green is an area in London, England, and is located in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is in east London and part of the East End of London, East End. The area emerged from the small settlement which developed around the common la ...

in England to general dealer James Crofts and Ann Rebecca, ''née'' Luxton, Crofts entered the workforce at the age of twelve, leaving school to work in a sheet metal factory and joining the Tinsmiths, Braziers and Gas Meter Makers' Society of London. He married Agnes Humphreys at Bethnal Green on 6 August 1893. He and his family moved to Melbourne in 1898, where Crofts became a member of the Sheet Metal Workers' Union (SMWU), serving as vice-president (1907) and president (1908–09). In 1911 he was on the first executive of the Federated Gas Employees' Industrial Union and in 1914 was elected to the SMWU's national executive. He defied his employer, the Metropolitan Gas Company, to attend a union meeting in Sydney in 1914 and was subsequently dismissed, but soon after won the position of secretary to the Gas Employees' Union, a paid position, winning the national secretaryship two months later. Crofts, an activist president, served on the Melbourne Trades Hall Council's executive and was its president from 1924 to 1925. He was secretary of the Commonwealth Council of Federated Unions from 1923 to 1927 and was first secretary of the

Australian Council of Trade Unions The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), originally the Australasian Council of Trade Unions, is the largest peak body representing workers in Australia. It is a national trade union centre of 46 affiliated trade union, unions and eight t ...

in 1927, a position he held until 1943. In 19430 he was the Australian delegate to the Fourteenth Session of the

International Labour Conference The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice by setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is one of the firs ...

in Geneva, the

International Federation of Trade Unions The International Federation of Trade Unions (also known as the Amsterdam International) was an international organization of trade unions, existing between 1919 and 1945. IFTU had its roots in the pre-war International Secretariat of National Tr ...

' Fifth Annual Congress in

Stockholm Stockholm (; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, most populous city of Sweden, as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in the Nordic countries. Approximately ...

, and the British Commonwealth Labour Conference in London; he also served as a deputy on the board of the

International Labour Organization The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice by setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is one of the firs ...

. A leading workers' advocate during the Depression, he retired from the secretaryship in 1943 to concentrate on his presidency of the Gas Employees' Union. Crofts was also active in the

Australian Labor Party The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also known as the Labor Party or simply Labor, is the major Centre-left politics, centre-left List of political parties in Australia, political party in Australia and one of two Major party, major parties in Po ...

, serving as a Victorian executive member and Federal conference delegate and being president (1926–27) and treasurer (1942–44) of the Victorian branch. He ran unsuccessfully for the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

in 1934. He was frequently an advocate in the Arbitration Court. Identified as a moderate within the Labor movement, Crofts was a firm anti-

communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

but identified as a

socialist Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...

. He died at Caulfield in 1950 and was cremated.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Crofts, Charles 1871 births 1950 deaths Australian Council of Trade Unions people Australian trade unionists Sheet metal workers Trade unionists from Melbourne